Nuclear Power and Coal: An Unexpected Marriage

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael F. Keller
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
The United States ◽  
Coal Resources ◽  
Hybrid Technology ◽  
Energy Independence ◽  
Change Concerns ◽  
New Facilities

America possesses hundreds of years of low-cost coal resources that are becoming increasingly unpopular due to climate-change concerns. The promise of the nuclear gas reactor also remains out-of-reach as a result of technical and cost considerations, while the high cost of conventional nuclear power greatly hampers the building of new facilities. Hybrid-nuclear power is an unexpected breakthrough solution to the growing energy and climate change dilemmas. The emerging hybrid technology can help revitalize the coal as well as nuclear industries while also significantly helping the United States achieve energy independence.

scholarly journals U.S. Energy Independence With Lower Emissions

2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 39-48
Author(s):  
Wes Williams ◽  
Balasundram Maniam ◽  
Geetha Subramaniam
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Natural Gas ◽  
Wind Power ◽  
Carbon Emissions ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Public ◽  
Energy Independence ◽  
Hydrogen Fuels ◽  
Over Time

Energy Independence as well as concern for carbon emissions are policy topics that have been frequently discussed on the public stage. This paper analyzes the possibility of creating an energy portfolio that will achieve energy independence while reducing carbon emissions and how that portfolio is likely to change over time. Domestic oil, hydrogen fuels, domestic natural gas, hydropower, wind power, solar power, and nuclear power are the fuels discussed to make up the energy portfolio that will eliminate the United States dependence on foreign oil while reducing the carbon emissions generated during the production of energy.

Nudges.gov

2014 ◽  
pp. 718-747 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cass R. Sunstein
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Behavioral Economics ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
The United States ◽  
Economic Incentives ◽  
Choice Architecture ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Default Rules

Behavioral economics is influencing regulatory initiatives in many nations, including the United States and the United Kingdom. The role of behavioral economics is likely to increase in the next generation, especially in light of the growing interest in low-cost, choice-preserving regulatory tools. Choice architecture—including default rules, simplification, norms, and disclosure—can affect outcomes even if material incentives are not involved. For example, default rules can have an even larger effect than significant economic incentives. Behavioral economics has helped to inform recent and emerging reforms in areas that include savings, finance, distracted driving, energy, climate change, obesity, education, poverty, health, and the environment.

The Benefits of Recycling for the Future of Nuclear Energy

2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan Hanson
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Energy Supply ◽  
Energy Demand ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Nuclear Energy ◽  
Nuclear Power Plants ◽  
The United States ◽  
Domestic Energy

Robust increases in energy demand, improvements in the performance of existing nuclear power plants, renewed interest in assuring domestic energy supply and concern about climate change have recently provided powerful arguments for renewing and further expanding the use of nuclear energy in the United States.

Hybrid-Nuclear Power: An Unexpected Energy Solution for the 21st Century

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael F. Keller
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Nuclear Power ◽  
Coal Gasification ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Large Body ◽  
Industrial Chemicals ◽  
Transportation Fuels ◽  
Helium Gas ◽  
Energy Independence ◽  
Hybrid Configuration

America possesses hundreds of years of low-cost coal resources that are becoming increasingly unpopular due to climate-change concerns. The high cost of conventional nuclear power greatly hampers the building of new such facilities, while the promise of the nuclear gas reactor also remains out-of-reach as a result of technical and competiveness considerations. Hybrid-nuclear power is a breakthrough solution to the emerging energy and climate change dilemmas. This unique technology springs from the observation that roughly half the power produced by a combustion turbine is used to compress air. By using low-cost nuclear fuel and a highly efficient helium gas reactor system with a combustion turbine, power plant output is significantly increased, costs are appreciably lowered and emissions are dramatically reduced. The helium gas reactor marriage with the combustion turbine and coal gasification opens the door for the continued use of our most abundant and low-cost fuel resource, coal. This hybrid configuration dramatically reduces environmental impacts while also supporting the co-production of all manner of liquid transportation fuels, substitute natural gas, hydrogen, and process heat as well as industrial chemicals. Solar and energy storage applications are also readily supported by the hybrid’s inherent flexibility. Hybrid-nuclear energy relies on tried-and-proven technologies as well as the large body of knowledge developed over the 50 year history of nuclear reactors and combustion turbines. The unique characteristics of the hybrid-nuclear approach allow the technology to overcome the engineering, financial and regulatory obstacles that have long held back the full-scale commercial deployment of the high-temperature gas reactor. The emerging hybrid-nuclear technology readily supports energy independence and can simultaneously help revitalize the increasingly challenged US coal and nuclear industries.

scholarly journals An Attack on the Separation of Powers? Strategic Climate Litigation in the Eyes of U.S. Judges

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (15) ◽  
pp. 8335
Author(s):  
Jasmina Nedevska
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Separation Of Powers ◽  
The United States ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Climate Politics ◽  
The Social ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Research Plan

Climate change litigation has emerged as a powerful tool as societies steer towards sustainable development. Although the litigation mainly takes place in domestic courts, the implications can be seen as global as specific climate rulings influence courts across national borders. However, while the phenomenon of judicialization is well-known in the social sciences, relatively few have studied issues of legitimacy that arise as climate politics move into courts. A comparatively large part of climate cases have appeared in the United States. This article presents a research plan for a study of judges’ opinions and dissents in the United States, regarding the justiciability of strategic climate cases. The purpose is to empirically study how judges navigate a perceived normative conflict—between the litigation and an overarching ideal of separation of powers—in a system marked by checks and balances.

Rethinking U.S. National Security after Covid19

2020 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Linda J. Bilmes
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
National Security ◽  
The United States ◽  
Emerging Diseases ◽  
Defense Spending ◽  
Federal Spending ◽  
Us Economy ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Military

AbstractThe United States has traditionally defined national security in the context of military threats and addressed them through military spending. This article considers whether the United States will rethink this mindset following the disruption of the Covid19 pandemic, during which a non-military actor has inflicted widespread harm. The author argues that the US will not redefine national security explicitly due to the importance of the military in the US economy and the bipartisan trend toward growing the military budget since 2001. However, the pandemic has opened the floodgates with respect to federal spending. This shift will enable the next administration to allocate greater resources to non-military threats such as climate change and emerging diseases, even as it continues to increase defense spending to address traditionally defined military threats such as hypersonics and cyberterrorism.

Stress Testing to Assess Recovery from Extreme Events

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
M. John Plodinec
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
Financial Institutions ◽  
Extreme Events ◽  
Stress Testing ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Rapid Spread ◽  
Potential Benefits

Abstract Over the last decade, communities have become increasingly aware of the risks they face. They are threatened by natural disasters, which may be exacerbated by climate change and the movement of land masses. Growing globalization has made a pandemic due to the rapid spread of highly infectious diseases ever more likely. Societal discord breeds its own threats, not the least of which is the spread of radical ideologies giving rise to terrorism. The accelerating rate of technological change has bred its own social and economic risks. This widening spectrum of risk poses a difficult question to every community – how resilient will the community be to the extreme events it faces. In this paper, we present a new approach to answering that question. It is based on the stress testing of financial institutions required by regulators in the United States and elsewhere. It generalizes stress testing by expanding the concept of “capital” beyond finance to include the other “capitals” (e.g., human, social) possessed by a community. Through use of this approach, communities can determine which investments of its capitals are most likely to improve its resilience. We provide an example of using the approach, and discuss its potential benefits.

Epic Cruelty: On Post-Pandemic Performance

2021 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 119-136
Author(s):  
Rick Mitchell
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United States ◽  
African Americans ◽  
The United States ◽  
California State University ◽  
The State ◽  
State University ◽  
White Supremacist ◽  
Systemic Racism ◽  
Disaster Capitalism

As today’s catastrophic Covid-19 pandemic exacerbates ongoing crises, including systemic racism, rising ethno-nationalism, and fossil-fuelled climate change, the neoliberal world that we inhabit is becoming increasingly hostile, particularly for the most vulnerable. Even in the United States, as armed white-supremacist, pro-Trump forces face off against protesters seeking justice for African Americans, the hostility is increasingly palpable, and often frightening. Yet as millions of Black Lives Matter protesters demonstrated after the brutal police killing of George Floyd, the current, intersecting crises – worsened by Trump’s criminalization of anti-racism protesters and his dismissal of science – demand a serious, engaged, response from activists as well as artists. The title of this article is meant to evoke not only the state of the unusually cruel moment through which we are living, but also the very different approaches to performance of both Brecht and Artaud, whose ideas, along with those of others – including Benjamin, Butler, Latour, Mbembe, and Césaire – inform the radical, open-ended, post-pandemic theatre practice proposed in this essay. A critically acclaimed dramatist as well as Professor of English and Playwriting at California State University, Northridge, Mitchell’s published volumes of plays include Disaster Capitalism; or Money Can’t Buy You Love: Three Plays; Brecht in L.A.; and Ventriloquist: Two Plays and Ventriloquial Miscellany. He is the editor of Experimental O’Neill, and is currently at work on a series of post-pandemic plays.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document